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This research seeks to contribute to current discussion of gender differences in experience of higher education. Its specific focus is to compare the assessment of various university services by male and female students. The research sample consisted of 9793 students who participated in three University of Western Sydney surveys in 2004 and 2005. The results suggest that, first, female students place higher importance on the majority of the university's services than do male students; second, as female students advance through their studies, they appear more demanding about the quality of services, while male students remain comparatively tolerant; and third, while all students consider that some areas warrant improvement, this is significantly more so for female than for male students. Specifically, the key areas for improvement from female students' perspective are the relevance and instructional clarity of the course and efficiency of administration. It is recommended that, considering the current trends in higher education across gender, a sharper focus on these areas for improvement action could help the university ensure equity and better manage competition.

Caption rate and text reduction are factors that appear to affect the comprehension of captions by people who are deaf or hard of hearing. These 2 factors are confounded in everyday captioning; rate (in words per minute) is slowed by text reduction. In this study, caption rate and text reduction were manipulated independently in 2 experiments to assess any differential effects and possible benefits for comprehension by deaf and hard-of-hearing adults. Volunteers for the study included adults with a range of reading levels, self-reported hearing status, and different communication and language preferences. Results indicate that caption rate (at 130, 180, 230 words per minute) and text reduction (at 84%, 92%, and 100% original text) have different effects for different adult users, depending on hearing status, age, and reading level. In particular, reading level emerges as a dominant factor: more proficient readers show better comprehension than poor readers and are better able to benefit from caption rate and, to some extent, text reduction modifications.

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If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -This paper aims to focus on the experience of monitoring of first year student attrition in a large metropolitan multi-campus university during 2004-2010. The paper seeks to discuss the trends in student attrition which have been found and identify key issues which have been and need to be addressed by the university in order to increase retention. Design/methodology/approach -A specially designed survey was repeated across the years and completed over the period by 2,085 undergraduate students who left the university before the end of their first year of study. Findings -The most important of issues which need to be addressed by the university are sufficient, correct and clear information provided to prospective students about the course before they enrol and high-quality course advice about subject choices after enrolment. Research limitations/implications -Sufficient, correct and clear information provided to prospective students about the course remains an area in need of improvement. Therefore, in marketing the university both locally and internationally, a particular focus needs to be on direct contact by knowledgeable staff with prospective students. Practical implications -Marketing of courses with support of academic staff, course advisers and program heads should give particular focus to the clear management of student expectations. Targeted marketing at the school/course level is needed in order to ensure clear and specific expectations management. This approach, if adopted, should help reduce attrition among those students for whom "the course wasn't what they expected". Social implications -Improving university student retention is one of the high-priority government targets in developed countries such as Australia, the UK and the USA. At the same time, higher education providers in these countries try to increase the participation of students from traditionally underrepresented groups of population in order to meet the aspirations of governments. The changes in policies and performance-based funding require universities to align the growth of numbers of students from underrepresented groups with a range of academic and general support services to support ...